Monday, October 31, 2011

A man was walking his dog one foggy Halloween night. Suddenly, from behind him he heard:BUMP! BUMP! BUMP!

Walking faster, he looked back. Through the fog he could see an upright casket. It was banging its way down the middle of the street toward him:

BUMP! BUMP! BUMP!

Terrified, the man began to run home, the casket bouncing quickly behind him:BUMP! BUMP! BUMP!

He ran up to the door, fumbled with his keys, opened the door and rushed in. He slammed and locked the door behind him. However, the casket crashed through the door, with the lid of the casket clapping: Clappity-BUMP!

Clappity-BUMP!

The terrified man ran up the stairs to the bathroom and locked himself in. His heart was pounding, his head was reeling, his breath was coming in huge gasps. With a loud CRASH the casket broke down the bathroom door, bumping and clapping toward him:Clappity-BUMP! Clappity-BUMP! Clappity-BUMP!

The man screamed and reached for something, ....anything! His hand closed around a bottle of cough syrup! Desperate, he threw the cough syrup at the casket, and

Saturday, October 29, 2011

The following was told by one of the aides at Avenidas, and is purportedly true. She said that one time she went to a Halloween costume party where everyone was supposed to dress up as a song title. One person came wearing a diaper. The song title? I cover the waterfront!

Friday, October 28, 2011

My nephew Jack is 6 years younger than I, so when I tell you that this incident happened when he was in junior high, you know it took place some years ago. Jack is now something over six feet tall, but back then he was quite short -- came up to about my shoulder. And he had a beautiful, clear complexion.

At the time we were living in a flat in San Francisco. We had the lower, and the landlord, a rather grouchy old gal, the upper. For that Halloween there was to be a big parade on a nearby main street, and Jack and his friends wanted to dress up for the event. The problem was that Jack had waited until the last minute, and didn’t have a costume.

His mother (my sister) came to the rescue. She dressed him in a skirt and blouse, and put a bit of makeup on his face. Then she put a bandana on his head. He was adorable.

Now he was ready to go off to the parade (I was to be his ‘boyfriend’), but first he wanted to go up and Trick or Treat our landlady. So he rang her doorbell, she opened the door, and Jack said, “Trick or treat!`” And the landlady responded with, “But little girl, you’re not wearing a costume!”

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

The dramatic rescue, captured by wildlife photographer Jean-Francois Largot, was played out in Kenya's Masai Mara game reserve.

Clinging on for dear life to the side of a vertical cliff, the tiny lion cub cries out pitifully for help. The mother arrives at the edge of the cliff as her son cries out for rescue after being trapped when he slipped.

Three other lionesses and a male arrive at the edge of the precipice. The females start to clamber down together but turn back daunted by the sheer drop. Eventually one single factor determines which of them will risk her life to save the youngster - motherly love.

Slowly, agonizingly, the big cat edges her way down towards her terrified son, using her powerful claws to grip the crumbling cliff side. One slip from her and both animals could end up dead at the bottom of the ravine.

Just as the exhausted cub seems about to fall, his mother circles beneath him and he is snatched up in her jaws. She then begins the equally perilous journey back to the top.

Minutes later, they arrive and she gives the frightened creature a consoling lick on the head.

Do we need humor a this point? Well, perhaps to relieve the tension.
Look out; it's yet another groaner --

Mahatma Gandhi, as you know, walked barefoot most of the time, which produced an impressive set of calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, which made him rather frail and with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath. This made him (oh, man, this is so bad, it's good)...A super-calloused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

This past Sunday Cliff and I attended a concert held at the Los Gatos High School. This is the Community Concert series, for which I bought season tickets. Amalie and I attended for many years before she passed away, as the association brings in some fascinating entertainers year after year.

The performers for this one was the Carpe Diem String Quartet, and I was a bit leery of this. Sounded somewhat stuffy to me. Whooo Boy, was I in for a surprise!

From the program notes: “Carpe Diem String Quartet, in residence at Ohio Wesleyan University, is an exciting ensemble that has captured the imagination of audiences, the respect of critics, and is one of the most versatile quartets of their generation. The group’s musical passion has led them down the paths of gypsy, tango, folk, pop, rock, and jazz inspired music, but the quartet is equally at home with the traditional string quartet repertoire.”

About the only kind of music they did not play that day was rock; nonetheless, they made that auditorium rock! And they seemed to have a lot of fun in the process! Additionally, they explained in language we could understand, what the pieces were about, and what to listen for. That really added to the enjoyment.

One of the pieces, entitled Fiddle Suite Montana, was written by Korine Fujiwara, one member of the quartet. She is the brunette in the photo. While she does not look the least Japanese, she explained that her grandfather was half Japanese, so of course her father is part Japanese.

One final note -- today one of the aides at Avenidas had asked me what I’d done over the weekend. When I told her, and mentioned the name of the quartet, she said that carpe diem meant seize the day, and then a bit later someone told me that was Latin. Learn something new every day.

Monday, October 24, 2011

The other day I saw an interesting phenomenon here at home. This is not a very complicated explanation, but it took me awhile to figure it out.

First, I have an awning on the front of the house. Note that it runs at right angles to the vertical blind inside the house.

Here is a photo of that same vertical blind taken from inside. If you look carefully, you can see the awning on the outside.

Now combine the horizontal awning outside with the vertical blind inside, and look what happens!

Interesting, yes?

Humor , as well as a warning --

When you drink Vodka over ice, it can give you kidney failure.
When you drink Rum over ice, it can give you liver failure.
When you drink whiskey over ice, it can give you heart problems.
When you drink Gin over ice, it can give you brain problems.
Apparently, ice is really bad for you.
Warn all your friends.

Friday, October 21, 2011

I tend to take these “remarkable emails” with a grain of salt. So I check them out at Snopes.com, and so often find out that they are not true, or at best, not verifiable. I checked the following at Snopes. They say that they verified the source as real. Further, Snopes commented that the Romanian writer had no idea that it would end up on the internet, as it was intended only for the local readers.

We rarely get a chance to see another country's editorial about the USA

Read this excerpt from a Romanian Newspaper . The article was written by Mr. Cornel Nistorescu and published under the title 'C'ntarea Americii, meaning 'Ode ToAmerica ') in the Romanian newspaper Evenimentulzilei 'The Daily Event' or 'News of the Day'.

~An Ode to America ~

Why are Americans so united? They would not resemble one another even if you painted them all one color! They speak all the languages of the world and form an astonishing mixture of civilizations and religious beliefs.

On 9/ll, the American tragedy turned three hundred million people into a hand put on the heart. Nobody rushed to accuse the White House, the Army, or the Secret Service that they are only a bunch of losers. Nobody rushed to empty their bank accounts. Nobody rushed out onto the streets nearby to gape about. Instead the Americans volunteered to donate blood and to give a helping hand.

After the first moments of panic, they raised their flag over the smoking ruins, putting on T-shirts, caps and ties in the colors of the national flag. They placed flags on buildings and cars as if in every place and on every car a government official or the president was passing. On every occasion, they started singing 'God Bless America !'

I watched the live broadcast and rerun after rerun for hours listening to the story of the guy who went down one hundred floors with a woman in a wheelchair without knowing who she was, or of the Californian hockey player, who gave his life fighting with the terrorists and prevented the plane from hitting a target that could have killed other hundreds or thousands of people.

How on earth were they able to respond united as one human being? Imperceptibly, with every word and musical note, the memory of some turned into a modern myth of tragic heroes. And with every phone call, millions and millions of dollars were put into collection aimed at rewarding not a man or a family, but a spirit, which no money can buy. What on earth unites the Americans in such a way? Their land? Their history? Their economic Power? Money? I tried for hours to find an answer, humming songs and murmuring phrases with the risk of sounding commonplace, I thought things over, I reached but only one conclusion... Only freedom can work such miracles.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

A woman has twins, and gives them up for adoption. One of them goes to a family in Egypt, and is named 'Ahmal.' The other goes to a family in Spain; they name him 'Juan.' Years later, Juan sends a picture of himself to his birth mother. Upon receiving the picture, she tells her husband that she wishes she also had a picture of Ahmal. Her husband responds, "They're twins! If you've seen Juan, you've seen Ahmal."

Wednesday, October 19, 2011

This is a true story. It was February, 1985, and biologist Stacey O’Brien had been working at Caltech for about a year when she was called into the office of one of the scientists. She was told that there was an owl with an injured wing, and needed a permanent home. The baby barn owl, only 4 or 5 days old. was so tiny and helpless he could not even lift his head. O’Brien says, “His eyes weren’t open yet, and except for a tuft of white down feathers on his head and three rows of fluff along his back, his body was pink and naked. I was smitten beyond reason by his hopelessly goofy appearance.”

It seems that the little creature’s wing was damaged in such a way that although it likely would be able to fly, it could never survive in the wild. Caltech was asking Stacey to adopt it. This was also to be a scientific project as Stacey was to observe him, and record his sounds and behaviors, perhaps learning more about barn owls than could be done at a distance. O’Brien says she was both thrilled and terrified of the opportunity, and said she would love to take the bird. She did and named the baby owl Wesley.

“Wise Old Owl” isn’t just a phrase. It turns out that owls really are quite intelligent. And they have other attributes that makes them most intriguing creatures. For example, owls don't stay in flocks, but mate for life. They are both playful and inquisitive, and can play with a ball like a kitten. O’Brien said that at Caltech she would sometimes pass by an office with an owl making up its own game. It would throw a pencil off a desk, watch it fall and roll on the floor, and then fly off the desk and pounce on the pencil. Even more interesting is that the owl brain is structured not for sight, though it does have keen night vision, but for sound. Owls do not use echolocation, as bats do, but by homing in on the tiny noises that prey animals make. I find this fascinating. An owl’s auditory sense is so powerful, it is said that in the winter, it can hear a mouse under 3 feet of snow by honing in on its heartbeat. O’Brien says that a barn owl’s satellite-shaped face focuses and receives the sounds, directing them to its ears. Unlike human ears, which are in the same place on each side of the head, owls‘ ears are irregularly placed. One ear is high up on the head and the other is lower. That way the owl can triangulate the location of a sound much more accurately than humans.

O’Brien tells this story with both compassion and humor, the ups and downs that she and Wesley endured over the years. This following incident had me roaring with laughter. She says that while Wesley was still an infant, she used to take him everywhere she went. She wrapped him in baby blankets, and held him in her arms, even when grocery shopping. Occasionally someone would ask to see the ‘baby’, and when she opened the blanket, they would leap back shrieking, “What is that? A dinosaur?” O’Brien says, “Apparently the world is full of educated adults with mortgages and stock portfolios who think that people are walking around grocery stores with dinosaurs in their arms.”

Of course O’Brien had to feed Wesley. There was no problem to know what he would eat. Barn owls ingest only mice, and Wesley would eat six a day. At first Cal Tech supplied her with mice that she kept in the freezer, but there came a time when Cal Tech was no longer able to do that. And O’Brien had to make other arrangements.